A Day in the Life of Jeff: Episode 3 – Eating Breakfast

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Welcome to ESLPod's “A Day in the Life of Jeff,” part three: Eating Breakfast.

I'm your host, Dr. Jeff McQuillan, from the Center for Educational Development. On our previous episode, we went into the bathroom, shaved, showered, brushed our teeth; now, we are ready to eat breakfast. Let's get started with part three: Eating Breakfast.

[Start of story]

I walk into my kitchen and turn on the coffeemaker. I always put the coffee, filter, and water in the night before so it’s ready to go. Next, I open the door of the cupboard where the cereal is stored. I would love to have ham and eggs for breakfast every morning, or maybe a stack of waffles, but the truth is that I just don’t have the time to cook.

So, I pour myself a bowl of cereal and put in a glass of skim milk, making sure I take a spoon out of the silverware tray. I go outside and pick up my newspaper, and sit down at the kitchen table. I love reading the paper in the morning, though usually I just have time to read a few of the stories. When I’ve finished my cereal, I grab a banana and maybe make a slice of toast with jam. I rinse off my breakfast dishes in the sink and put them in the dishwasher. By that time, my coffee is ready so I pour myself a cup and put the rest in a Thermos for work.

[End of story]

In this episode, we are eating our breakfast. I begin by walking “into my kitchen and” turning “on the coffeemaker.” Notice these verbs, to walk into or to walk in, to turn on. Those two word verbs are very common in English. So, I don't just walk to my kitchen, “I walk into my kitchen and” I “turn on the coffeemaker.”

The coffeemaker, “coffeemaker,” (all one word) is the machine that, you can guess, makes the coffee; that's the coffeemaker. Usually, a coffeemaker has water on the top — place where you put the water — and then, it has a place for the actual coffee. Now, you take the coffee and you put it into a piece of paper or a piece of plastic called a filter. The filter, “filter,” is something that allows the water to go through it, but doesn't allow the coffee to go through it.

So, you put the coffee into the filter and the hot water goes through the coffee, it goes out of the filter and goes into the coffee pot, “pot,” the coffee pot is on the bottom. So, you have the coffee, the coffee filter, and the coffee pot. After the water goes through the coffee, what you have to throw out — what you have to remove when you are done — are called the coffee grounds, “grounds.”

Well, I put in “the coffee, the filter, and the water the night before,” meaning, in this case, last night, “so that it is ready to go,” meaning when I walk into the kitchen, it is already ready, I just have to turn it on. Some coffeemakers have clocks that will automatically turn your coffeemaker on in the morning.

“Next, I open the door of the cupboard where the cereal is stored.” The cupboard — cupboard, which looks like the word “cup” and the word “board” put together, but is pronounced cupboard — a cupboard is like a cabinet. It's a place where you store things — a place where you keep things. To store, “store,” as a verb means to keep something in a place — to keep something in a cupboard, or cabinet, or a box. Well, the cupboard is what we call the cabinets that are in the kitchen.